Tag Archives: Prayer

Chaplains: Serving in a US Military “Hostile to Christianity”

“You know the old saying that there’s no atheists in the foxhole? Well God help us if all we have in foxholes are atheists.”

The July 13 edition of World Magazine asks if the US military is a “no pray zone?”, with the magazine cover saying “How the US military is fighting religious liberty.” Contributor Edward Lee Pitts pens the cover story “Holding the Line,” with the tag line

Chaplains are pursuing their mission in a military suddenly hostile to Christianity and ready to suppress religious freedom

In an era in which the military is being repeatedly called “hostile” to religious freedom — including by members of Congress — this characterization may not be as over the top as it seems.  After listing just a portion of the recent “incidents” of Read more

Prayer Breakfasts and Spiritual Fitness

Chaplain (LtCol) Jason Logan:

Prayer Breakfasts are important because they address the soldier’s deeper needs.  The Army believes fundamentally that the American soldier is more than just a body and that each soldier has unique needs. One of those specific needs – or pillars as we call them – is spiritual fitness.

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Study on Faith in the Foxhole from World War II

Reports on the American Soldier Studies, with data gathered immediately following World War II, indicate Soldiers relied on prayer more — and other ideals less — as battles got tough.  The study is entitled “Are There Atheists in Foxholes? Combat Intensity and Religious Behavior:”

The American Soldier studies were conducted by the Army’s Information and Education Division. An upcoming analysis of that data, to be published in the Journal of Religion and Health, finds when soldiers reported that battles became “more frightening,” as many as 72 percent of them turned to prayer as their primary source of motivation. When battles were Read more

Navy Chief Chaplain Delivers Nightly Prayer

The Chief of Navy Chaplains, Chaplain (RAdm) Mark L. Tidd, recently visited the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz.  With regard to the current environment, he made a point of saying chaplains can help in the fight against sexual assault.

Tidd’s training and conversations with Nimitz’ chaplains and leaders included sexual assault prevention and awareness guidance. According to Tidd, a chaplain’s confidential counseling can play a crucial part in the lives of sexual assault victims.

“A chaplain can confidentially help a victim determine how to proceed [and decide] whether to make a restricted report or an unrestricted report that can lead to an opportunity to bring people to justice,” said Tidd.

The article makes a side comment that would likely register with few:

Tidd also conducted the ship’s evening prayer Read more

Military Leaders Call for Moral Courage, Leadership

In the face of the “sexual assault” scandal in the US military, Department of Defense leaders fanned out across graduation ceremonies to call on new and graduating officers to live out moral courage.  From Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel, speaking to the graduating class of 2013 at West Point [ellipses original]:

When you are faced with difficult decisions, you will always know that the right thing to do…is the right thing to do.  Do it.  Listen to yourself and be guided by what you believe is right.

Standing against the crowd and choosing the harder right instead of the easier wrong, as the Cadet Prayer prescribes, can be very lonely and frightening at times.  And it requires immense moral courage.

It is an interesting position to assert that every officer knows the right thing to do — meaning many in the current controversies have been knowingly choosing to do the “wrong thing.”  Of course, the “moral courage” to which Secretary Hagel refers presupposes a knowledge of right and wrong; normally, that is defined outside of “listening to yourself,” unless one includes a moral and religious upbringing in one’s character.

Secretary Hagel is Read more

Sally Quinn Shills for Michael Weinstein

In case you were wondering why the Washington Post blog on Michael Weinstein’s visit to the Pentagon made him out to be so “heroic” — and never once raised a critical eye to his cause — it’s because the author, Sally Quinn, supports his cause.

In her recent commentary on the National Day of Prayer, Quinn calls the National Day of Prayer “unconstitutional”, and she spends most of her column lightly mocking Greg Laurie’s call for a national religious revival.  Tellingly, she never pauses to acknowledge Laurie’s liberty to make such statements.

Quinn also criticized the US Army at Fort Leonard Wood for Read more

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